Water, Population

May 21, 1985|The Morning Call

To the Editor:

A few words about the water shortage. First, the problem is not limited to the Delaware Basin. Out west, the waters of the Colorado River are 105 percent allocated to various large users (that's right water subregions report that water is being used faster than it's being replaced.

We must keep in mind that there are so many gallons of fresh water on this planet, and no more (less, if we keep putting toxic wastes into our wells).

The total consumption of any resource (like water) is equal to the amount that the average person uses, multiplied by the number of persons in the area.

If we don't have enough water in the area, we have two choices: We can get the average person to use less, or we can find a way to have fewer people in the area.

The first choice has already been exercised by restrictions on water use. In the long run, it won't be enough, and if the drought persists, not in the short run, either.

Fewer people in the area? As we can see from the first paragraph, it's a national problem, so it won't help to get people to leave the Delaware Basin. They really have no place to go. So, the answer is to have fewer people in the country.

Whoa! Are we talking about killing off a few, or deporting them? Of course not. But there are other important ways to have fewer people.

One way is by attrition - that means we don't replace all of those who die. The way to do this is have very small numbers of children (0, 1 or 2). It also means frowning on those parents who have more than that number from now on.

And we can stop letting millions of foreigners into the country. At the moment, these folks account for 40 percent of our yearly increase of 2.7 million. True, it's misery that pushes most of them to come here, and we want to help. But do we want to help so much that we make ourselves miserable, too? In my opinion, it would be far better to send economic aid to where they are and keep them there.